Chickenzilla
by Lucillia
Summary: For those who wanted the Chicken Chapter from The Consequences of Drunken Experiments to become its own story. Things go off into left field and the Uchiha Massacre gets derailed when the giant chicken that a smashed Orochimaru created escapes and a young Naruto finds it.
1. Chapter 1

Orochimaru chugged down the cough medicine, completely ignoring the warning label that indicated that one of the medicinal herbs in the concoction had mild hallucinogenic properties when consumed in large enough doses...

**6 Months later:**

The new recruit, a young Genin named Kabuto raced into Orochimaru's quarters looking badly singed and rather worse for wear.

"Sir!" Kabuto yelled. "The fire breathing monster chicken has escaped!"

"The...what?" Orochimaru said, feeling his brain break as he tried to process the child's statement.

**3 Days later:**

A seven year old boy named Uzumaki Naruto settled down for the night underneath a tree after spending the day aimlessly wandering through the miles and miles of woods surrounding Konoha. The temperature reached near freezing levels that night, but that was okay since a giant chicken had sat on him and kept him warm.

The next morning, Naruto led the chicken which he'd named Bawk into town, grinning from ear to ear since he had a pet he could bring to Show-and-Tell. He'd gone into the woods looking for one, and had thought that he would have to go home empty handed.

Later that morning, when the Kyuubi Jinchuriki rode into a classroom that was starting to look like a menagerie due to a rather poor idea that had been borrowed from the civilian elementary school on a five foot tall chicken, the only thing that was going through the Instructor's mind was What. The. Fuck...?

**The next morning:**

The Hokage sighed as he wrote up a D rank mission to create a giant chicken coop for Naruto's new pet which he was sure to receive a number of complaints about. He made a note to insure that it was fireproof as a six foot gout of flame nearly incinerated Homura.


	2. Chapter 2

Before Bawk found Naruto, she'd had an adventure. It wasn't much of one, but for a chicken, even a fire breathing Chicken, it had been full of danger and excitement, at least as far as Bawk was concerned, it had.

Before Bawk had met Naruto, she had been called Experiment 327. She'd lived in a pen in a dark underground room and had never seen the sun. Someone would come around once a day to measure her before feeding her a bucket of bird food mixed with charcoal and clearing out the newspaper in her pen. It hadn't been a particularly good or interesting life, but it had been a safe and predictable one.

One day, a rather surly looking person stormed into her pen, rather roughly grabbed her and made the usual measurements before slamming down her feed bucket and clearing out and replacing her newspaper, swearing all the while. When the unpleasant person had left, it had **left the gate open.**

Somewhat curious about the world outside her pen, Experiment 327 nudged the slightly ajar gate open further and poked her head out. The world beyond was rather dull looking and wasn't covered in newspaper.

After wandering around a bit, she found a narrow area that she could barely squeeze herself into. Out of curiosity, she did. She then found that she had to continue going forward because she could not go back. Eventually, after what seemed like forever while her heart pounded and she worried that the way would grow narrower and narrower until she couldn't move and she'd be stuck for all eternity, she found herself in a wide open area. The floor beneath wasn't as hard on her feet as it had been in the narrow place, and the ceiling above was dotted with hundreds of tiny white lights. As she moved forward, a strange substance on the ground that moved a little bit like newspaper but didn't feel like it tickled her toes.

Behind her there was a yell of "Who left the door open?" and a loud slam. When she turned around, it had been to see that the narrow place that led back to her pen with newspaper and food had vanished forever.

With a heavy heart as she wondered if she would find another pen with newspaper and food, Experiment 327 set out to explore the gigantic room that she had found herself in.


	3. Chapter 3

Experiment 327 spent a long time going ever forward in the massive room she had found herself in. After a long while during which she wondered at the purpose of the tiny lights in the ceiling which did almost nothing to illuminate the room which was still rather dark, a new light started coming on. Unlike the lights she was used to, it did not snap on immediately. Instead, it slowly brightened, and changed the room around it as it did.

First, the velvety dark ceiling began to gray, then, it began to change color, shifting to a large number of colors that she had no name for. Eventually, the ceiling and walls settled on the color of one of her caretakers' hair, and remained so for a while. Eventually, as she continued through a sea of unusual objects that didn't seem to have a clear purpose other than to be tall and tower overhead, the process reversed itself as the light turned itself off, taking the bright round thing with it.

This happened two more times during a period in which Experiment 327 had wandered in a roughly straigt line across the room, coming to the end of the tall things at one point before finding herself in a flat area that had a bunch of water coming out of a tap that was flowing to the ground and away instead of in her water bucket and found herself fleeing into another area that was full of the tall objects that just stood there swaying in the whatever that was coming out of hidden air conditioning vents. She had almost drank from the water, but instead found herself fleeing in fear when she saw people who towered over her. There were two of them, and they weren't moving. They seemed to be focused on each-other, but they could notice her at any second and turn her into "Dinner" as a couple of her less than pleasant caretakers had suggested. As what she ate was also called "Dinner", she was certain that she did not want that to happen.

The fourth time the walls and ceiling were dark and had the small lights she came across a small caretaker. He was much smaller than the ones who came to feed and measure her. That meant that he was a hatchling. She knew what to do with hatchlings. You sat on them and kept them warm when it was cold.

Experiment 327 walked over to the hatchling who was curled up and shivering since its mother had apparently abandoned it, and made it her own.


	4. Chapter 4

As Naruto shivered, wondering if he was going to die from the cold like he'd heard happened to people who stayed out during the winter, something soft and warm settled on him, chasing away the cold. When he reached out to feel exactly what it was, his hand found feathers instead of the blanket he was half expecting considering what happened the last time he stayed out too long, and eventually a massive scaly foot. He wasn't being carried home by the weird masked people who would lecture him forever, was being sat on by a giant bird!

Cool!

Naruto had gone out into the forest earlier that day practically the instant the Academy had let out to look for a pet he could bring to class tomorrow. His new teacher was a total bastard. He'd be a totally awesome instructor if he wasn't so mean to him though. That morning, Wanaka-sensei had announced that they would be having something called a Show-and-tell in which each student was to bring a pet of theirs to class and show it to everyone.

After he had made his announcement, Wanaka-sensei started asking the members of the class about their pets. He was sure that he'd win this and make a bunch of friends. He had the coolest pet ever. There was just one little problem however...

"Uzumaki, what kind of pet do you have?" Wanaka-sensei asked.

"I've got a rabbit!" he replied.

"Really?" Wanaka-sensei asked, sounding surprised.

"Yep!" he replied. "He's big and he's this really awesome shade of orange! I'm not sure if I should let him out of his cage and bring him to class though. Every time I see him he talks about stomping on Konoha and eating the Uchiha. The blonde guy said he was on a time-out the last time I tried letting him out of his cage."

"You stupid moron!" Wanaka-sensei yelled. He was looking sick for some strange reason, maybe he needed to go to the hospital since he was all pale and shaking. "That's not a pet, that's an imaginary friend! How could you not tell the difference?"

The entire class laughed at him then.

He had gone out into the woods deciding that he would show them. He'd bring back the most awesome pet ever, and they all would have to acknowledge his superiority. He'd caught a lizard earlier, but it bit him and ran off. The same thing happened with the owl he caught. He had been determined to stay out here and find a pet though. He'd vowed that he wouldn't go back until he'd found one. His determination had payed off however, because a giant bird had found him!


	5. Chapter 5

While Naruto was being sat on by a giant hen, the Uchiha were left to figure out exactly how they were going to deal with the boy before and after the coup. This had all started when the Clan head and his wife had been sitting down to a relaxing dinner with their sons...

"How was school honey? Did you make any new friends today?" Uchiha Mikoto asked her younger son once the meal had been served.

"No. But I found someone who won't ever be my friend." Sasuke replied.

"Who?" she asked.

"Uzumaki Naruto!" Sasuke replied.

"Why not?" Mikoto asked wondering if the boy she hadn't pressured her son into becoming friends with had inadvertently done something that trampled over his feelings as Kushina was wont to do with her, and everyone around her for that matter. Sasuke was a rather sensitive child after all.

"His imaginary friend wants to eat our clan!" Sasuke replied.

Fugaku choked on his rice, and Itachi came to the rescue. Itachi was always such a helpful child...

Fugaku started choking once more, when Sasuke informed the family that the Uzumaki child's "Imaginary friend" was a gigantic orange "Bunny rabbit". Itachi couldn't help him this time as he was choking too. Little Sasuke raced over to pound his brother on the back while she went and rescued her husband.

&!&!&!&

"Next on the agenda is discussing what will happen to the Kyuubi Jinchuriki." Fugaku said after he finished reading out the minutes of the last meeting and hearing the reports of various clan members during the meeting later that evening.

"Kill it!" one of the elders yelled.

"You do remember what happened when the last host died don't you?" one of the numerous random Uchiha relatives asked.

"We needed a new host." the elder replied.

"And a new clan compound, and a er, new half of Konoha as well." the random Uchiha replied.

"Don't kill it!" the Uchiha elder said.

"Setting a guard on it to prevent others from killing it may be advisable." one of the other elders said.

"Good idea." Fugaku said as he picked several relatives he didn't like and appointed them to be the prankster's permanent guard.

"Oh, and Shisui, I want you to teach the child the Shunshin, so he could flee from any danger that may manage to get past us." Fugaku said once he'd finished selecting the guard rotation. He hadn't forgotten who it had been who had put magenta hair dye in his shampoo and tried to frame the Jinchuriki for it.

"You want me to teach a kid who is reportedly as dumb as a box of rocks my signature technique?" Shisui replied.

"Yes. Do you have a problem with that?" he asked in his best "I'm the head of the clan, so don't mess with me, you won't like the consequences" tone.

"No." Shisui replied.


	6. Chapter 6

When Naruto got up the next morning, he learned that herding a giant chicken was a difficult task. It was worth it as far as he was concerned though. His new pet was orange just like fluffy his foul mouthed rabbi- er, imaginary friend. This was totally the best day ever.

Eventually, he got the idea to hop on the bird's back, and turn its head in the direction he wanted it to travel in. The chicken seemed to get the idea rather quickly, and they were soon making their way back to Konoha at a brisk pace...

&!&!&!&

Yakushi Kabuto sighed as he made his way towards Konoha's gates. Instead of taking a week's vacation to the Capitol like he had filed time off for, he had gone to the lair of his new master. If he had known his week would be half as bad as it had been, he would have run for the Capitol in a heartbeat.

On his first day in Otogakure, he'd been forced to prove his superiority to a couple of meatheads, which had translated to a good hour long fistfight which he had only won by the skin of his teeth. After that, things had improved until four nights ago when an experiment he'd never personally laid eyes on escaped from captivity.

He'd gone in to break up a fight between some of the other recruits that were standing next to a large pen, had gotten caught in a Katon jutsu for his struggles, discovered that the fight had been over who would inform Lord Orochimaru of the escape of one of his experiments, and that he'd volunteered since everyone else had just run off. He'd run around the base for a while searching for the bastards before deciding to just get it over with. Besides, what was the worst that could happen?

When Orochimaru-sama hadn't even seemed to know anything about the "Monster Fire-breathing chicken", he began to wonder if someone had been trying to put the newbie on. It turned out that there really was a fire breathing chicken however, and that it was running around loose somewhere.

He learned exactly why the others had been fighting not to be the one to tell Orochimaru that the creature had escaped when Orochimaru handed him a bucket of bird feed and ordered him to bring the animal back. He had spent two days and nights searching to no avail, and had only managed to worm his way out of the task last night when he pointed out that he needed to be getting back to Konoha.

By the time he reached Konoha's gates, he was hot, he was tired, he looked like he'd gotten himself on an arsonist's shit-list, he smelled, and a small blond boy blew past him on a five foot tall chicken.

Shit.


	7. Chapter 7

Ichigo Wanaka groaned as he surveyed the menagerie that was his Academy class. He'd borrowed the idea of "Show-and-tell" from the Civilian school, and had introduced it to his class with the idea of it being a prelude to a rather fun and informative lesson on Ninja animals and their uses on the battlefield. He was seriously regretting this idea however as there were several children barely managing to restrain their various pets, many of which were trying to eat each-other. There was one small plus. Naruto and the "rabbit" he contained weren't here to cause further chaos.

Eventually, he got the class settled down into something that resembled order. He would just have to do his best to ignore the deer that was crapping in the corner. That's right, what deer?

He then did his best to take roll over the various barks, hisses, and squawks of the animals his students had brought. He wasn't even going to ask where Uchiha Fugaku's son had gotten his hands on a talking cat, or where his cousin had gotten the ill-tempered raven.

As he was marking Uzumaki Naruto absent, the door slammed open, and the Uzumaki boy rode in on a...What? The? Fuck?

"Whaddya think of my new chicken?" the Uzumaki child yelled. "I named it Bawk!"

This had to be a Genjutsu. That's right, a Genjutsu. There was no way in hell the Dem- the Uzumaki brat just rode in on a giant chicken. He was just fucking with him. It was yet another of the boy's atrocious pranks.

"Kai!" he yelled as he disrupted his chakra.

The chicken was still there, still standing there, blinking with those creepy orange eyes that matched its bright orange feathers.

He bit back a whimper as he stabbed his hand with a Kunai. There was no way in hell he was going to whimper or cry out in pain in front of this class. Children were like sharks, they could smell blood from a mile away, and rather quickly moved in for the kill.

The chicken was still there, and the class that had been silenced by shock was now yelling questions left, right, and center at both him and the boy, and he could make little to nothing out from the babbling sea of voices.

"QUIET!" he roared at the class, causing the Nara deer to bolt and run into the chicken who briefly panicked before firing a six foot long gout of flame at the animal which fortunately managed to dodge, causing just about every other animal in the room to panic.

_Yes, this had most definitely been a very bad idea_. he thought as he ran for help in sorting out the chaos that was his classroom thanks to the Uzumaki boy and his rather unconventional "pet".


	8. Chapter 8

Uchiha Fugaku had been enjoying one of his extremely rare quiet days at home when his son raced in yelling "Dad! I want a fire breathing chicken like Naruto's got!" as he unceremoniously dumped one of Nekobaa's precious ninja cats in the entryway without a second thought.

And just that morning, Sasuke had been completely awed over the fact that he would be allowed to bring the creature to school with him...

Wait? Did Sasuke just say "fire-breathing chicken"?

&!&!&!&

Akimichi Chouza licked his lips as he saw the giant chicken stride past. Mentally he was picturing wings and drumsticks that were actually filling.

It was his ability to plan for the future that had made him stop before he could purchase the bird, drag it home, and order his wife to cook it up then and there. If he ate it now, there was a good chance that he would never again see anything like it again in his lifetime. If he got it to breed however...

If it produced offspring even half that size...

With the thought of having a bird like that on his table whenever he was so inclined, he walked up to the pint-sized owner who was riding the animal in order to talk business.

&!&!&!&

It had been a very long day for Uchiha Shisui, and it was about to get longer as he was supposed to spend his evening teaching some brat who apparently had a little sign that said "Space for Rent" where his brain was supposed to be how to do the Shunshin. Sure, it was supposed to be a relatively easy jutsu, but from all accounts, the child hadn't made any progress on the Academy Three which the Shunshin was a step above.

Great.

After trudging up several flights of stairs rather than climbing up the side of the building, in order to postpone the inevitable, he knocked on the door to the child's run-down apartment and waited. Eventually, after what sounded like a struggle, the door opened and...he found himself face to face with a giant chicken?

&!&!&!&

The Hokage stared at the various reports and papers on his desk, wondering if someone had pulled a prank on him. First had come the maintenance request from the Academy for repairs to be made due to fire damage. That was pretty normal, as similar requests crossed his desk almost every week. He'd almost immediately stamped it without a second glance until his eyes fell on the listed cause.

Then, came the contract between Akimichi Chouza and Uzumaki Naruto that he would have to approve as the boy's legal guardian. The thing looked to have been written on the back of a piece of scrap paper, and had to do with the breeding of giant chickens.

Then came the reports from Naruto's watchers...

It looked like he would be having to pay his successor's son a visit in the morning.


	9. Chapter 9

The Hokage made his way over to Naruto's apartment, almost completely ignoring his teammates and Danzo who were nattering on about some meeting of concerned citizens. He'd deal with that meeting later, but now, he would need his wits about him as he didn't want to be caught in one of Minato's brat's pranks. He knew exactly why the child booby trapped the floor around his apartment, and while he didn't entirely approve, he understood and allowed it.

After leaping over a cleverly placed trip wire and dodging a couple of other similarly juvenile traps, he was at Naruto's door. After a couple minutes of knocking, he realized that Naruto wasn't there. Instead of leaving, he let himself in and decided to wait for the boy. While it could be hours before the child could return, those hours would be hours that he'd escaped his paperwork.

He found a massive chicken that had to be at least five feet tall standing if it was an inch sleeping in the middle of the main room. He briefly wondered how the child had gotten the animal inside his apartment and decided he was probably better off not knowing.

Sighing at all the paperwork this was going to cause, he pulled out a scroll and started writing a D rank request for the construction of a giant chicken coop next to the building. He could have taken the child's pet away and had it studied and dissected, but he knew that wouldn't be a good idea considering all of the chaos and destruction Naruto could cause if he did so, especially if he got it into his head to "rescue" the animal.

Constructing a coop and asking Naruto's permission to study the creature was the cheaper and easier option in this instance.

After watching Homura nearly get incinerated when the chicken woke up while he was entering the apartment, he added a request that the coop be fireproof.

&!&!&!&

"So, how did it go?" Uchiha Fugaku asked Shisui who had come to his office to make his report.

"The de- er, the Uzumaki child has to be an idiot savant or something." Shisui said, sounding somewhat awed. "He had the Shunshin mostly mastered by the end of the evening. Early this morning, I saw him doing it without the usual distraction that is incorporated into the technique. He didn't need it however since he was so fast at it that if you blinked, he was gone."

"Good?" he said, wondering if he'd made the right decision. He had woken up at three that morning with the sudden realization of what could happen with an Uzumaki Naruto who was proficient with the Shunshin. He was hard enough to catch after his pranks as it was.

&!&!&!&

"Hokage-sama!" an ANBU in a tiger mask said as he knelt before the Sandaime who was in the kitchen refilling the chicken's water bucket. "You asked me to report if the diplomatic delegation from Iwa encountered Naruto."

There was a loud clang as the bucket fell into the sink. The Sandaime paled several shades.

"Wh-What happened?" he asked, fearing the worst. While Naruto mainly resembled his mother, there was enough of a resemblance to his father that someone who was sufficiently intelligent or sufficiently paranoid might chose to harm him.

"They took one look at him, pissed themselves, and ran." the ANBU reported.


	10. Chapter 10

Naruto grinned as he looked at himself in the mirror. Perfect. He looked just like Shisui-niisan. He set out some of the chicken food that the Old Man had given him last night for Bawk. The team that was going to be building Bawk's new home were outside already and arguing about where to put it.

Once Bawk was fed and watered, he grabbed his books and his lunch and set out to the Academy.

The first person he encountered at the Academy was Kiba. Kiba was loud, but he was cool sometimes, and they occasionally skipped class together.

"Um, Naruto. Why are you wearing eye make-up?" Kiba asked.

"To look like Shisui-nii." he replied. "All the best ninjas wear make-up. Shisui-nii told me so."

"Yeah. Sure. Whatever." Kiba said as they went into class.

&!&!&!&

When Ichigo Wanaka - who had gotten a great deal of confusion over his name since thanks to some unknown ancestor he had a family name that was more commonly a given name - came into class that morning, it had been to find the Uzumaki boy drawing on Uchiha Sasuke with an eyeliner pencil.

It wouldn't do to let the Uzumaki become friends with the likes of an Uchiha especially since...

"Uzumaki!" he yelled. "What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm making Sasuke look like a totally awesome ninja like..." the demon brat started.

"Totally awesome ninja? You're making him look like a fag. Only fags wear make-up." he cut across the boy's explanation.

Instead of getting upset at the demon brat and pushing him away like he expected him to, Sasuke turned and glared at him. The demon brat got up and turned to leave.

"Uzumaki! Just where do you think you're going?" he bellowed at the boy.

"I'm going to go tell Shisui-nii that you called him a fag." the demon brat said before vanishing altogether.

"Whatever." he said before turning to call roll, wondering why the Uchiha boy was still glaring at him. Whatever it was, it wasn't his problem.

He came to seriously regret his actions at the start of class when a Uchiha with very familiar eye markings showed up fifteen minutes into the lesson and beat the shit out of him.

&!&!&!&

Uchiha Fugaku had a massive headache. One of his own had attacked an Academy Instructor for no apparent reason, and had to be pulled off the man and brought in. The Hokage had strongly hinted that if he didn't deal strongly with Shisui, he would.

As he was debating on whether or not he should take an asprin and be on call or take something stronger and knock himself out for the rest of the day, Sasuke raced into his office looking worried.

"You're not going to send Shisui-nii to prison are you?" Sasuke asked.

"No. Why?" he asked. He had been planning on suspending the brat for a month without pay.

"Good." Sasuke replied, looking relieved. "That Instructor got what he deserved for calling me and Shisui-nii fags."

"Your Instructor what?" he asked, hoping he'd misheard his son even though what the child was saying had confirmed Shisui's explanation for his actions.


	11. Chapter 11

Uchiha Fugaku was having a very bad week. First, the Hokage had refused to fire the Academy instructor for calling his son a fag even though there had been an entire room full of witnesses. The man was on indefinite medical leave, but still, there was the principle of the thing. Secondly, Uzumaki Naruto's pranking had been kicked up several notches now that the kid had a reliable method of escaping both the Police and the ANBU, which he used incredibly frequently. He'd been getting angry visits and letters from the heads of the other clans since it had gotten out that Shisui had been the one to teach Naruto the Shunshin.

To make matters worse, his son had spent every waking moment that they were in contact begging for and outright demanding a giant fire breathing chicken. None could be found however, though the Head of the Akimichi clan was trying to figure out how to get a normal sized rooster to breed with the bird without getting itself roasted.

Speaking of said chicken, members of the police force had had to herd the creature away from the Academy and back to its pen three times already. This was rather difficult as they had to constantly dodge and put out fires as they did so. It seemed that the bird who had been christened "Bawk" had grown incredibly attached to the Uzumaki boy and didn't like to let him out of her sight.

He'd been trying to figure out how to deal with Sasuke's constant demands for something that was truly unobtainable. His wife had suggested getting the boy a different animal. It was for that reason that he was going to allow the boy to sign the clan's Hawk contract which was currently in storage, since Nekobaa's cat had left in a huff because Sasuke had insulted it. Hawks were like chickens if you sorta squinted. They were both birds after all.

With that in mind, he called up the clan's fastest runner and sent him off for the contract.

&!&!&!&

Sasuke excitedly raced home from the Academy. His father had said that he would have a surprise for him when he got home, and that he'd like it. Yes! His father had finally found a giant Fire-breathing chicken! Hopefully this one would be black.

"Dad?" he called out when he got back.

"In here." his father called from his office.

"Did you finally get me a chicken?" he asked excitedly.

"Nope." his father said as he pulled out a dusty old scroll. "I got you something better."

"How is that better than a giant fire-breathing chicken?" he asked, feeling completely disappointed. He asked for a chicken, and his dad gave him a manky old scroll. Mom was better, when he asked her for something, she gave it to him.

"It's a hawk summoning contract." his father said. "As soon as you learn how, you'll be able to summon giant hawks that you can ride into battle after you sign it."

"Hmm." he said. That did sound cool. There was one thing that confused him about the animal summoning contract though...

"With all of the clan members named after different species of weasel, I would have thought that we would have had the weasel contract and not the Hawk one." he said. He'd heard something about animal summoning contracts during the ninja animals lesson and how they were either passed down through families or down teaching lines.

"We did." his father replied. "But, my grandfather lost it to the second Kazekage during a game of cards."

&!&!&!&

"Thanks for the lift." Takeda Masao said as he grabbed his grocery bags from the improvised cargo sling they had been set in.

He'd broken his hip last week, and had been having a great difficulty getting around since he wasn't as young as he used to be. He'd been hobbling home with his groceries when the Uzumaki boy had offered him a ride. At that point, he would have been willing to accept a ride from a half starved cannibal due to the pain in his leg. Rather than being cruel and going "Psych" before riding off, the boy had helped him aboard the giant chicken that had managed to carry both their weight as well as his groceries.

Instead of just riding off, the boy helped him bring his groceries into the house and helped him get set up comfortably in the living room.

It seemed that he'd misjudged the child.

"Dad, why is the kitchen orange?"

Perhaps not.


	12. Chapter 12

Madara sat outside Bawks coop studying the creature. He could use a fire-breathing chicken. Well, technically he didn't need one, but he could incorporate it into his plans somewhere. It seemed somewhat intelligent. Maybe he could induct it into the Akatsuki. The bird seemed a great deal smarter than some of Pein's recruits.

He couldn't steal the bird, as that would cause a commotion he didn't need at this rather delicate juncture in his plans. Perhaps he could get the child to give the bird to him. How would he get the child to talk to him though?

Maybe he could offer the boy some candy. Kids liked candy, right? He remembered his brother getting excited when father brought some home with them back when they were little.

If the boy didn't deal with him, well, he didn't have to fulfill his part of the bargain until Itachi had done his...

&!&!&!&

Naruto cautiously approached the Nakano shrine. Some weird old guy with a mask had offered him a five pound bag of candy if he met him behind the Nakano shrine. He knew going was stupid, but, candy...He'd just run off if the old dude tried anything.

He was about ten minutes early, but the old guy was already there, and he was talking to Sasuke's older brother Itachi.

"...know what'll happen to Sasuke if you don't fulfill your part of the bargain and kill the rest of your pathetic clan." the old man was saying.

"You need have no worries about me not keeping my side of the deal." Itachi said. With that he left.

"Do you have my candy?" he asked the old man when he finally reached the shrine.

"Yes." the masked old dude said. "But first, there is something I'd like to discuss with you."

The old man moved towards the bushes and indicated that he should follow.

That's it. Candy or no candy, he was gone.

!

Three days later, Naruto found himself attending a funeral. Shisui-nii had died. He'd drowned in the river. Even though he didn't seem all that welcome, Fugaku Police Chief-san had let him come. Everyone else was carefully watching him as if they thought that he'd be disrespectful enough to pull some sort of prank.

"Why are you here?" one of the people asked Sasuke's older brother after the service was over. "I didn't think that Shisui's murderer would actually have the gall to show up at his funeral."

That wasn't right, Itachi would never murder anyone. That creepy old guy from three days ago however...

"Itachi didn't kill Shisui-nii!" he yelled. "It was that creepy old guy in a mask who said that he'd molest Sasuke if Itachi didn't kill everyone!"

"Is this true Itachi?" Fugaku Police Chief-san asked.

Itachi looked cornered for some strange reason.

"It wasn't so much molest as "Eviscerate and leave out for the crows to feast upon"." Itachi finally answered.

"What was your answer Itachi?" Fugaku Police Chief-san asked.

"You were all going to die next week." Itachi replied.


	13. Chapter 13

Mikoto sighed as she set that night's dinner on the table. Even Naruto's enthusiastic squeal over the ramen she'd prepared that evening didn't lift her mood. The past week had been rather stressful. The only bright spot as far as she was concerned had been when the plans for the coup had been placed on the back burner in favor of finding the mysterious masked man who had blackmailed Itachi into a plot to murder the clan. This had been made somewhat difficult by the fact that Itachi refused to give any information about the man or why he wanted to kill off the Uchiha.

Barring the interrogation by the clan elders, Itachi had spent the entire week at home, as he was on leave pending a mental evaluation. While people commended Itachi's unswerving loyalty towards his brother, everyone in the clan except her and Sasuke did their best to completely avoid him. Mealtimes were rather tense when Fugaku was around, which fortunately wasn't all that often since Fugaku had recently taken to sleeping and eating elsewhere. Learning that your son was perfectly willing to kill you tends to put you off going home.

Naruto had come to stay with them at her insistence after she'd learned that Naruto had learned about the masked man's plot when the man had lured Naruto to the Nakano shrine with the promise of candy, apparently planning on dragging Naruto into the bushes to molest him after he was finished threatening Itachi. Naruto needed looking after, and it was finally time she did right by Kushina, no matter what her husband said.

If only she could find a way to get that chicken out of her yard...

&!&!&!&

Bawk quietly settled on what she'd learned was called a lawn, which was an area that contained the green stuff that tickled her feet when she'd made her first steps away from the place where she'd been born and little else. One of the larger caretakers had taken her little chick into her nest alongside the two chicks she already had, and taken to feeding him. She knew that if she waited long enough though, her chick would come out to her. Her chick loved her just as much, if not moreso than the caretaker who had him now.

Several caretakers who belonged to the flock that the caretaker who adopted her chick was from had attempted to chase her away, but she always returned. Her chick would always be her chick, and she would make sure he was well cared for.

&!&!&!&

Uchiha Madara - as he called himself since the original had passed on, leaving him the name amongst other things including the Moon's Eye Plan - wondered at the actions of the civilians of the village he was wandering through in hopes of finding someplace half-way decent to eat. Normally, people would smile at his odd appearance, especially when he did a few tricks and acted like an idiot in order to appear harmless. Now however, they were pulling their children away from him, and moving to the other side of the street the moment they noticed his approach. Those not accompanied by children were following him at a cautious distance.

A poster on a bulletin board outside the grocery store - with a sketch of him that was a very good likeness on it - answered his question. According to the wanted poster, he was an unknown criminally insane S-ranked pedophile.

They'd pretty much gotten everything right except the pedophile bit. He was asexual by choice thank you very much.

Looks like it was time for a haircut and a change of mask, yet again. Why this particular misunderstanding about his sexual preferences kept happening, he did not know.


	14. Chapter 14

Naruto grinned as he rode Bawk who had grown a bit over the last month so she now stood at five and a half feet in height through the streets of Konoha. Life had been going good for him. He now had a mom, and an older brother. They belonged to that jerk Sasuke, but since they let him live with them, they were his too now.

He was away from the house and the family training grounds today because Fugaku was home. He'd been doing his best to stay away from the head of the Uchiha Clan and the Chief of Police ever since the man had tried to strangle him when he'd learned that it had been him who had put the laxative in the station coffee pot last year.

Aside from Fugaku being home, today had been a pretty good day. Itachi had taught him a neat trick which he was so going to use to get out of class tomorrow. The beauty of the situation would be that nobody would realize that he wasn't in class when he used the Jutsu Itachi had taught him.

&!&!&!&!&

Bawk was happy. She was getting better feed and more exercise. Her chick was much healthier now that he had some caretakers, and she'd nearly incinerated that old one-eyed creep who occasionally came spying around the red-eyed caretakers' compound. Seeing the man run around with his right buttock on fire had been exceedingly amusing, and had made her week.

&!&!&!&!&

Sasuke smiled. His father was home. Even better, his father was home, and he was spending time with **him**!

Today, his father was going to show him how to summon hawks using the contract he'd signed earlier.

"Do I really have to cut myself?" he asked his father when he watched him demonstrate the hawk summoning jutsu.

"Yes. It's part of the contract. All ninja who have summons have to offer up their own blood, and sometimes the blood of others as well in order to get the summons to cooperate." his father replied.

Feeling slightly nervous at the prospect of cutting himself, he went through the handseals that his father had demonstrated several times, channeling his Chakra and focusing on what he wanted. He then cut his thumb and flung the bleeding appendage into the air, sending the blood that welled up from the cut flying up and away from him in an arc.

There was a large puff of smoke and a pop as something appeared where there had been nothing before. As the smoke cleared, he learned that that something was very large and had a very sharp beak and talons.

"Oh look, dinner." the bird said.

He gulped and backed away from the vicious looking creature which took off, turned back in his direction, swooped down, grabbed him in its wicked looking black talons, and flew away with him.

He did the only thing he could think of doing in the situation, he pissed himself and started crying for his mother.

"Well fuck." Fugaku said as he summoned his own hawk in order to retrieve his son. Itachi would skin him and nail his hide to the compound gates if something happened to Sasuke. That was if Mikoto didn't get him first.


	15. Chapter 15

Danzo snarled as he put out the fire on his ass and used a healing jutsu to deal with the first and second degree burns he shouldn't have gotten since he was wearing fire-proof underwear. One of these days the assassins he kept sending were going to get that bird, and they'd see who had the last laugh then.

Deciding that he needed a little pick-me-up, he decided that it was time for that merchant Gato who'd tried to stiff him to go. After calling his forces to him, he settled down and got some paperwork done. By the time he was done filling out his second supply requisition form, everyone who wasn't currently out on a mission was gathered in front of him. Everyone except Michi that was.

"Where's Michi?" he asked.

"He's hiding under the bed." one of the younger recruits that he hadn't yet bothered to come up with a name for replied.

"He's wha...? Why is he hiding under the bed when he should be here?" he said, startled at being thrown for the first time in a long time.

"I'm not entirely certain, but he keeps muttering things about green, shiny teeth, and youth." another recruit who was presumably Michi's roommate replied.

Violently suppressing the urge to bury his head in his hands and sigh, he decided to go and find Michi. When he did, he had a very special task set aside for the boy to complete.

"Guess who's just volunteered for Chicken Assassination duty." he said when he reached the room Michi occupied.

Aside from a slight whimper, there was no response.

&!&!&!&

"Dear," Mikoto asked in a tone that could freeze Nitrogen. "Can you tell me why Sasuke seems to be afraid of birds?"

Being Sasuke's mother, it would be hard for her not to have noticed such a drastic change in her son's behavior after it had seemingly cropped up out of the blue two days before. She could almost understand Sasuke being afraid of Naruto's pet chicken considering the fact that most people who encountered it were wary of it, but trying to dive under the house every time a sparrow flew by overhead...

Fugaku was amazingly poised considering the situation. He stood firm, proud, and expressionless. In fact, he almost seemed completely frozen in place.

"Dear," Mikoto said, her tone hovering somewhere near absolute zero. "I'm not going to ask you again."

Fugaku swallowed, nervously licked his lips, opened his mouth to speak, closed it when no sound emerged, turned, and ran.


	16. Chapter 16

Naruto laughed as he tussled with Bawk in the woods surrounding Konoha. He'd decided to take yet another day off school today, and rather than prank anyone, he'd decided to have a bit of a walk. Bawk had of course followed him out of the village.

After walking a while, he and Bawk had gotten to playing. Bawk had torched a couple of trees and a shrub in their roughhousing but she hadn't torched him. As he tickled bawk's clawed yellow feet, something seemed to hit him and he froze for a moment.

"Oh crap." he said, paling rapidly.

Mikoto-kaasan was going to kill him.

* * *

><p>The new Academy Instructor Umino Iruka stared at the spot where Uzumaki Naruto had been just moments before. The boy had been ignoring his lesson in favor of staring out the window, and he'd thrown a stick of chalk at him in order to get his attention. Rather than yelling about how getting hit with the chalk hurt, rubbing the new sore spot on his head, and grumbling like most students of the Uzumaki's temperament would, Naruto had vanished in a puff of smoke revealing that the boy who'd been staring out the window and daydreaming had been a Shadow Clone all along.<p>

"Remind me again why the- he's in the Academy." his best friend and temporary assistant Mizuki said, sounding slightly impressed.


	17. Chapter 17

A rather charred Michi huddled out of the rain under the porch of an apartment building knowing that he could not return to ROOT headquarters until he had taken out his target as Danzo-sama had ordered. The problem was, the avian who answered to the appellation of Bawk had proven far more wily and resourceful than anticipated.

All attempts at assassination had failed.

"Hello, what are you doing out here?" a ninja that he identified as Hatake Kakashi said, peering into the interior of the underside of the porch where he was taking shelter.

"My boss said I couldn't go home until I got my work done." he said, telling the technical truth without giving anything away about the organization he belonged to as he was supposed to.

"I see..." Hatake Kakashi said. "Did he say anything about not going to someone else's house?"

"No." he replied, cold, miserable, and wondering if it were a trap. Konoha's regular forces occasionally mistook them for spies, and they sometimes got treated accordingly. One of the first things Danzo-sama had told him when he'd taken him from the orphanage was that he would not rescue him from the T&I department.

"I have a friend who would be willing to take you in at least until the rain stops." the Hatake said.

Though it was against his better judgement, he followed the other ninja who belonged to and was supposedly loyal to Konoha to a building two streets away. After the Hatake knocked on the door of an apartment on the third floor in an apparently prearranged pattern, the door opened slightly.

"WHAT BRINGS YOU TO MY HUMBLE HOME MY HIP RIVAL?!" a familiar voice boomed.

"I found a waterlogged rat under a porch." the Hatake said, moving aside and giving the occupant of the apartment a clear view of him and him a clear view of the occupant.

It was HIM.

Oh gods! The Green and the Teeth and the Green and the Teeth! It was just as horrible as he remembered!

"THERE IS NO NEED TO COWER MY MOST YOUTHFUL FRIEND! I WILL HAVE YOU DRY IN AN INSTANT! IF I CAN'T, I WILL CRAWL AROUND KONOHA WITH MY ARMS TIED BEHIND MY BACK A THOUSAND TIMES!"

Michi's brain shut down in order to protect itself, and the ROOT operative fell to the floor in a self-induced coma.

"Heh, works every time."

"DID YOU SAY SOMETHING?!"

* * *

><p>The Hokage sighed as he wrote a note requesting Fugaku's presence. He hadn't exactly wanted to give the order to have the Uchiha executed, but had reluctantly given the order to do so for the safety of his village which would've been plunged into all-out war had the Uchiha staged a coup. Since Itachi who had pinned the blame for the Uchiha clan's aborted execution on someone else had been caught, he would have to resort to other methods. Until then, he would attempt to negotiate with Fugaku until a proper contingency plan could be put into place.<p>

Hopefully, diplomacy would win out. But, he had the sinking feeling that that might not be the case, even if it looked like the coup had been shelved by the Uchiha in favor of finding the man who was supposed to be Itachi's accomplice in the aborted massacre.

Only time would tell however.

* * *

><p>Orochimaru sighed, as he waited for Manda to return so he could correct his orders. Knowing the giant snake, it would take another hundred sacrifices before he could send the creature back to Konoha.<p>

It had all started when the seventeenth retrieval team had returned empty-handed. Experiment 327 had proven far more resourceful than anticipated and had completely evaded every last one of the capture teams that had been sent to Konoha after he had learned the creature had evaded a number of assassination attempts. After medicating his headache with a fifth of some sort of grain alcohol that one of his minions had claimed was whiskey but he could've sworn was lighter fluid, he decided to take more drastic measures when it came to retrieving his experiment, and had summoned Manda...

_"And when you get to Konoha, I want you to..." Orochimaru was saying to the giant serpent that towered over him when he was interrupted._

_"Orochimaru-sama," the minion/experiment who had been following him around for the last hour said before he could finish giving orders to the giant serpent. "The kitchen staff want to know if you want chicken with your dinner."_

_"Screw the chicken!" he yelled at the minion. "Can't you see I'm...Manda? Manda?!"_


	18. Chapter 18

Yamanaka Inoichi walked into the boy's room, picked up the clipboard from the slot on the back of the door, and reviewed the Doctor's notes. Sighing with relief, he walked over to the shaking boy's bedside. Dealing with a brat from an unsanctioned militia with a serious Gai phobia would be easy after what he'd been stuck dealing with over the past few days.

Those poor shinobi who'd followed Manda's path of destruction through the village and witnessed that crime against nature firsthand had been driven mad, and he'd been recruited in order to help bring order back to their minds and get them back to a point where they could be sent out into the field and be trusted to not promptly attempt to commit Suicide by Ninja their first mission out.

Getting back to his usual work was a relief after that, especially since he'd been forced to witness The Incident secondhand so many times that he'd become almost completely desensitized to it.

* * *

><p>Naruto stared in awe at the egg that Bawk hadn't allowed anyone else get close to. It looked like the eggs that he used to get in a carton, except for the fact that it was twice the size of his head. After giving him a good look at the egg, Bawk sat back down on it to keep it warm. Smiling, Naruto turned around and raced home.<p>

"Mikoto-kaasan! Guess what! Bawk's gonna have a baby!" Naruto yelled as he pulled off his sandals.

There was a loud crash from the kitchen, and an even louder one from Fugaku's private study which was rather strange considering the fact that Fugaku hadn't been home for a long while, having taken to sleeping at the station after the Hawk summoning incident.

"I'm gonna name him Shisui!" Naruto yelled as he put his sandals away.

* * *

><p>Manda sighed as he listened to the congratulations he'd received from the emissary from the Toads who'd apparently received word from their senile prophet that he was to be a father again. Not being very paternal, since few snakes were, the only feeling he had about the news that he'd sired a crime against nature was the vague hope that his offspring wouldn't do anything that would reflect poorly on him.<p>

He'd say that his last mission for Orochimaru had been the strangest he'd ever been given, but he had vague memories involving something to do with the eldest son of the Sage of the Six Paths that had occurred back when he was a hatchling.


End file.
